Each city asking voters to extend tax for 10 years

Louisville resident Jerry Pearson, left, and his new friend Lily Meyer enjoy the nice weather as Riley the black Lab sniffs around at Davidson Mesa Open Space in Louisville on Monday. (Jessica Cuneo / Daily Camera)

Open space by the numbers

Tax revenues collected in the past decade:

Lafayette: $7.8 million (Lafayette pays for maintenance and enhancement of parks, open space and trails through a second fund taxed separately)

Louisville: $11.8 million

Amount spent from open space fund:

Lafayette: $6.7 million

Louisville: $9.7 million

Fund balance:

Lafayette: $800,000

Louisville: $8 million

Acres of open space:

Lafayette: 1,300

Louisville: 1,800

Miles of trails:

Lafayette: 18

Louisville: 45

Source: Cities of Lafayette, Louisville

Altogether, Lafayette and Louisville own and manage more than 3,000 acres of open space.

But if voters in both cities decide to reject open space tax extensions on this year's ballot, they can expect acquisition money to quickly dry up and not another acre of land added to the cities' inventories.

"We would immediately stop acquiring any open space property, and we'd not be able to do it for the foreseeable future," Thomas Davinroy, chairman of the Louisville Open Space Advisory Board, said of the city's 3/8-cent open space sales and use tax. "We are consistently ranked as the No. 1 place to live in the United States, and a large part of that is the open space and the trail system we have."

Lafayette Open Space Advisory Committee Chairman Dave Belin said his city is eyeing the purchase of about 800 acres of additional open space in the city, but those pursuits would have to be placed on hold if the city's 1/4-cent open space sales and use tax is voted down.

"Do we want to go into maintenance mode, where we're just maintaining what we currently have, or do we want to grow the amount of open space acreage we have and build new trails?" he asked.

Louisville and Lafayette are putting Issue 2A and Question 2A, respectively, before voters. Residents in each city will be asked to extend the open space tax for another 10 years -- to the end of 2023 in Louisville and the end of 2024 in Lafayette.

In the last decade, the tax has brought in $11.8 million in Louisville and $7.8 million in Lafayette. Lafayette has a separate 1/4-cent parks, open space and trails tax that is solely dedicated to maintenance and enhancement, while Louisville's open space tax funds everything from the acquisition and maintenance of property to the upkeep of public parks.

While there doesn't appear to be any vocal opposition to the tax extensions in either city, at least in terms of social media efforts or political websites dedicated to opposing them, Independence Institute President Jon Caldara said now is not the time to extend a tax.

"It seems to me in an economically difficult time a government extending a tax that they said they'd let expire, it's good to let them know that every now and then they should let expire a tax they promised would," he said. "I think that keeping money in the private sector is better than keeping it in the public sector."

Not always approved

Boulder County voters haven't always approved open space tax increases or extensions. In 2010, voters denied an effort by the county to increase sales taxes by 0.15 percent -- or 15 cents on a $100 purchase -- for 20 years to buy new open space land. That vote came a year after a similar open space tax increase was turned down at the ballot box.

Caldara, who lives in Boulder, said the open space acreage in the county isn't going anywhere and that requesting an extension of a tax is more appropriate when the economy is once again firing on all cylinders.

"Don't worry, you will always have another chance to vote for open space taxes," he said. "In Boulder County, there is only one phrase that will raise more money than 'It's for the children' and that's 'It's for open space.'"

But Louisville City Manager Malcolm Fleming said it's not that simple. There isn't just the acquisition of property at stake, there is also the ongoing maintenance of that property. Next year, Louisville plans to use money from its open space fund to pay half the cost of building a $1.4 million underpass beneath McCaslin Boulevard, connecting Harper Lake with Davidson Mesa. Lafayette wants to build another four to six miles of trails.

Fleming said the elimination of revenues from the tax would result in a major strain on the rest of Louisville's budget because the city would be forced to "backfill" open space funding requirements with money from other departments.

"If we were to spread the burden around, it would be felt by every part of the city," he said. "It would be huge."

'I'm all for it'

Jerry and Millie Harris, Lafayette residents who already have voted to approve the tax extension, were walking their dogs along the Coal Creek Trail in Louisville this week. They said they love the fact that they can seamlessly walk or ride from their home in Lafayette to neighboring communities. They said they are eagerly awaiting the opening of the final four miles of the Coal Creek/Rock Creek trail, linking Lafayette to Erie and both municipalities to Broomfield.

"It's great to live in a county that values open space and government services," Millie Harris said.

Belin, the Lafayette open space committee chairman, said creating connections between communities, like the trail from Lafayette to Erie, is considered by residents to be a high priority. Along with connectivity, he said, residents also want open space to serve as an attractive buffer between cities. Lafayette and Boulder County jointly purchased the Mountain View Egg Farm a couple years ago on the east side of Lafayette to create a space free of urban sprawl between the city and the new Anthem neighborhood in Broomfield, Belin said.

"It serves as a buffer, but it also serves as a trail corridor," he said.

Jeff Corder, a 17-year Lafayette resident, said he wasn't even aware he had been paying an open space sales tax for more than a decade. But as he passed under Public Road on the Coal Creek Trail this week, he said he was pleased with all the trails and open space the city is providing. He uses the properties three to four times a week, he said.

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